


a single red hair

by imagymnasia



Category: Legend of Eli Monpress - Rachel Aaron
Genre: Gen, but mostly it's friendly ribbing, light shippy content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-05
Updated: 2015-10-05
Packaged: 2018-04-25 00:29:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4939759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imagymnasia/pseuds/imagymnasia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Obviously, this can be either shippy or just good friends ribbing each other. I'm not a Miranda x Eli fan (at least not since I finished the series), but people can ship what they want. :3 Ain't no judgment here.</p><p>As always, thanks for reading!</p></blockquote>





	a single red hair

Josef considered himself a fairly observant person. Eli would have a few things to say to the contrary, but not everyone could live up to the thief’s ludicrously high standards. And Josef didn’t want to– he was fairly sure Eli’s enormous ego had something to do with it, and Josef and Nico had promised each other long ago that if one of them started to act like the thief, a swift intervention was in order. 

In any case, it was with no small amount of sadistic pleasure that the swordsmen spied a glint of red against the dirty blue of Eli’s coat. He smiled to himself, then casually remarked: “Say, Eli– what’s that on your shoulder?”

A brief flicker of panic passed over Eli’s face before his expression turned sour. “You must be dumber than you look if you think I’ll fall for that again.”

“No tricks,” Josef answered, holding up his hands in surrender. He just barely kept the self-satisfied grin off his face. “Just genuine concern.”

“Right, and I’m running off to Zarin to join the Spiritualists. I’d look dashing in red bed sheets, don’t you think?”

“Oh shut up,” Josef grumbled, rolling his eyes. He reached forward and plucked the red thing from Eli’s coat. “I was talking about this.”

“What is it?” Nico asked, creeping forward to peer at the thing. ‘It’ was a hair, glinting like copper even in the subdued sunlight of the forest. The hair curled around Josef’s finger as he held it. When he pulled it straight, it was about the length of his forearm, give or take an inch.

“My my,” Josef said, his voice unusually smug, “what have you been up to, Monpress?”

“What?” Eli gave him a look. “Oh. That’s probably Miranda’s.”

“Miranda’s?” Nico echoed.

“Yes,” said Eli, “surely you remember her. Red hair, lots of rings, giant dog, keeps trying to throw me in  prison? Lovely girl really; wish I could say the same for the mutt.”

“And what were you doing with the Spiritualist girl?” asked Josef. Eli had the dignity to blush.

“Escaping the great citadel of Gaol?” he reminded them, exasperated. “What do you think I– no, scratch that, I know what you’re thinking, and you are so far from the truth–”

“Well,” said Josef, trying not to laugh, “how’d it get there?”

“We were escaping together,” Eli repeated. He did so slowly, enunciating each word as if he thought Josef stupid; which, Josef realized, he probably did. “How should I know how it got there? I’m a prisoner, she’s a prisoner, we break out– thanks to quite a lot of genius on my part, might I add– then she’s slapping shackles on my wrists and–" 

"And… what?” asked Josef, as innocently as possible for a man wearing his own weight in cutlery. Eli stared at him dumbly, first with irritation then with increasing horror as the pieces all clicked into place. 

“ _Powers_ , Josef!” exclaimed the mortified thief. “We  _escaped_! That’s  _all_! I slipped those cuffs as soon as we were out and then I–”

“You mean you played along for a little while?”

Eli grinned. “Of course! You should have seen the look on her face when I–  _not like that!_ " Josef was chuckling now, and even Nico was smiling behind the sleeve of her coat. Eli, who was starting to get angry, glared at the two of them.

"What is wrong with you?” he cried. “I’d sooner marry Slorn than get involved with a Spiritualist,  _especially_  that one! At least Slorn would make me nice things and not preach me to death.” Eli made a face. “Honestly.”

“You’re right, Eli,” Nico said softly. “It is a little ridiculous." 

The boy gave her a grin and a sweeping bow. "Thank you, Nico.”

“Yeah,” Josef said, shrugging. “She could do better.” Eli gave him a rude gesture and turned on his heel, stomping of into the forest and grumbling to himself about ungrateful mouthy swordsmen. Josef chuckled. He shifted the Heart’s weight on his back and turned to Nico.

“Well, we’d better go after him.” The girl only nodded and followed the swordsmen into the trees.

**Author's Note:**

> Obviously, this can be either shippy or just good friends ribbing each other. I'm not a Miranda x Eli fan (at least not since I finished the series), but people can ship what they want. :3 Ain't no judgment here.
> 
> As always, thanks for reading!


End file.
